


The Storyteller

by unamusementpark



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, gamkar - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-09-29
Updated: 2017-09-29
Packaged: 2019-01-06 11:46:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12210660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unamusementpark/pseuds/unamusementpark
Summary: Karkat Vantas is a slave. He's not happy, of course, but at least his life is predictable. Shame the storyteller went and fucked that all up.





	The Storyteller

The first day the storyteller came into the village, Karkat was overjoyed. It was the middle of winter, the snow piled up so high most people turned away from traveling into Heinjal, which was nestled in a snug valley between two mountains- Grynd and Krynt, they were called. No one outside the village knew their names, but every traveler knew that attempting to cross between them in the middle of winter was suicide.

Well, every traveler except this one, it seemed. The storyteller appeared one day out of nowhere, wild-haired and sleepy-eyed. He hadn't had much, not even a horse- just a goat that looked like it ate better than he did and an empty sack. He didn't have the lavish clothing and harsh accent the last traveling storyteller had had, instead slipping into a dialect from the other side of Grynd.

Some accused him of being a faerie, but they were quickly silenced. Winters were long and harsh, and even a faerie was welcomed if it was going to tell stories. Stories held emotion, warmth, something to grasp onto and tell over and over until the threads of it ran thin and every child in the village run out of games to play based off of it.

Karkat hadn't seen the storyteller yet. As a slave, he wasn't allowed to go out and see him whenever he fancied it. He had to bide his time. To wait. And even if he never saw the storyteller, he'd get to hear his stories, even if it was never quite as good as hearing it straight from their mouth.

It was four days after the storyteller arrived that Karkat's owners invited him into their home. It was a tradition here- the more respected the guest, the longer the wait until they were invited into your home. To invite the guest too early was to say that they couldn't survive on their own.

Karkat put his hands on the edges of the tray, trying to stop their frantic shaking. He'd be able to see the storyteller (well, his feet, at least), to hear his voice, and maybe, if he was lucky, a story. He forced himself not to smile. _A story!_ He, Karkat Vantas, slave, might be able to hear a story straight from a storyteller. He had once heard that hearing one kept you warm for a straight month after hearing it, and while he wasn't gullible enough to believe that, he hoped it would give him something to think about during the long, dull days.

He took a deep breath and picked up the tray. The jug of Ytp'quin didn't spill, but he could see it shaking the tiniest bit. Better on time and shaking than late and calm. He exited the kitchen, bare feet silent on the wooden floor as they should be. He could hear his own breathing loudly in his own ears.

It was a small house by most foreigner's standards, but by Heinjal's standards, it was huge. It felt bigger than usual as Karkat moved silently along, his mind racing more quickly than his feet were moving. He could see the storyteller in his minds eye. He had only heard that he dressed like a poor man and brought a goat with him everywhere (his 'pat', he called it), so his imagination was free to run wild. He had made the harsh winter trip without much injury or illness, so he was obviously a hero of some sorts. Karkat's mind immediately jumped to a muscular man, body scarred by fights and war. In his mind, the storyteller was native to Heinjal, or at least somewhere around it- skin paler than the snow outside, eyes the light blue of a morning sky. The storyteller had a rough exterior, but was always willing to lend kindness, as was proven by the goat. Yeah, that had to be close.

Karkat reached the dining room and pushed the door slowly open with his shoulder. He kept his eyes on the floor. As a slave, he wasn't allowed to look at those above him. He could look at their feet, but otherwise, unless given permission, he had no idea what most people looked like. (Well, he was supposed to have no idea. Sneaking glances was easy.)

"You the fuckin' slave what I got myself at to hear about?" said an unfamiliar voice. The speaker sounded to be around Karkat's age. Young for a storyteller, almost too young. It took everything in him not to look up out of sheer curiosity.

"Yes," Karkat said. He moved towards the end of the table. He could see a single pair of feet at the end of it. Much like his, they were bare, and almost as dark as the wooden floor. Looks like he was wrong about where the storyteller was from, then.

"You ain't gotta look down none, brother," the voice said. Karkat looked up so quickly he almost spilled the jug of Ytp'quin.

The storyteller was... disappointing. Where Karkat had been expecting a fierce warrior ready for any sort of battle, he saw a thin boy who looked on the verge of starvation. His hair was wild, curling out and standing on end. Burn scars ran across his face in a diagonal slant. His right eye had the clouded, milky look of blindness, not that he could tell very well. The storyteller's eyes were so heavily lidded it was a wonder he could see at all, working eye or not. Karkat had heard he was wearing clothes too thin to have possibly survived, and now he understood. He wore nothing but a thin wolfskin cloak and beggar's rags.

The storyteller smiled and laughed at the disgusted look on Karkat's face. "Who are you?" The way the storyteller spoke was strange. How the hell he managed to make a living off of talking was a mystery, unless he completely changed everything about himself when he told stories. Including how he looked.

"How the _fuck_ did you survive the passage?" Karkat asked before he could stop himself. "You don't even have shoes." He immediately went pale, closing his mouth in shock at his own audacity.

The storyteller winked. "Trade secrets, brother."

Karkat dropped his eyes, barely suppressing a _What the hell is that supposed to mean?_ He set the Ytp'quin on the table, took a step back, and bowed. He was about to tell the storyteller to call for him if he needed him, but he cut Karkat off before he could even start.

"You ever met a motherfuckin' storyteller before?" he asked casually, as though Karkat were someone who wasn't so far below him it was ridiculous.

"No," Karkat said cautiously, thinking this was some kind of test. Maybe the storyteller was trying to bait him somehow.

"Well shit, brother, wanna hear a story?

Karkat stared at him. He didn't _look_ like he was joking, or even like he was testing him somehow. He still had a serene expression on his face, waiting for an answer.

"I'm a slave," Karkat said slowly.

"Uh huh," said the storyteller.

"And you want to tell me a story."

"If you wanna hear one. Aw, shit, I fuckin' forgot. Take yourself onto sitting down whenever you motherfuckin' feel like it. Ain't no one better than no one, ya dig?"

Karkat did not dig. "I have to go," he said, turning on his heel and walking out. The storyteller did not call after him and he was not called upon for the rest of the day, so he cleaned and assumed that was the end of that.

<><><><><><>

That was not, in fact, the end of that. The storyteller didn't visit the house again, but he always seemed to be where Karkat was when he left the house. When Karkat was getting a ~~stupid~~ new sword for one of the ~~little shits~~ darling angels he served, standing outside the blacksmiths, jumping up and down to help keep himself warm, the storyteller arrived with a cup of something foreign and hot. When Karkat was retrieving herbs from the apothecary, there was the storyteller, holding a bundle of bright green flowers and offering to help Karkat carry his own herbs back to the house.

There was one specific time that was absolutely baffling. No matter how much time he spent turning it over and over in his mind, Karkat couldn't think of a single possible reason that the storyteller would have been there, much less offering to help.

He had dropped a tray of Ytp'quin, spilling it on the precious wooden floor he cleaned, and his owners had been angry. No, not angry. Enraged. Enraged enough to send him out into the snow without enough clothing to keep him even close to warm. He had to somehow survive all night outside as punishment for spilling a drink. No one would allow him into their homes- unless his owners gave express permission, that was theft.

His lips had been turning purple when he had felt a hand on his shoulder. He had turned, stomach suddenly sinking, positive he had somehow frozen to death, but it wasn't the grinning skull of Death there to greet him. It was the thin, worried face of the storyteller. He had asked if Karkat was all right, and when Karkat had refused to answer, he had disappeared. Later, he found a pile of expensive furs near the house in which he lived. There was nothing around them, but he knew exactly where they had come from.

<><><><><><>

There was a knocking sound. Karkat could hear someone knocking on something wooden, the sound muffled by the corridors it had to travel through. He knew what that meant- a foreigner was announcing that they were at the door. The storyteller. Again.

He sighed and stood, wiping his wet hands on his pants. Doing the laundry was tedious, but at least it wasn't confusing and frustrating, unlike some people standing at the front door at this very moment. At least if the storyteller was here, that meant he was here to see Karkat's owners. The very idea of coming to see Karkat was ludicrous. Surely even this odd storyteller wouldn't do _that_...

Would he?

Karkat didn't know, but it wasn't like he could ignore the knock. He rushed as quickly as the dread in his stomach would allow him to.

"Hey hey, brother," said the storyteller before Karkat could say a word. "I need to talk to you."

He felt something inside of him curl up and die. He sighed and asked, "What the hell do you want?" before he could stop himself.

The storyteller didn't seem to mind. Casually, as though he were making a remark about the weather, he said, "Do you wanna become my, uh, apprentice? That ain't the word _exactly_ , but I don't think your language what's go-"

Karkat shut the door in his face.

He stood dumbly, staring at the door, struggling to understand what the hell storyteller thought he was talking about.

He opened the door.

"You want me," he said, trying to get him to understand what he was implying, "to be your apprentice?"

The storyteller shrugged and nodded as if to say, _Close enough._

"I have owners."

"Pfft, it ain't no big deal, I'll buy you off 'em," he said.

"You're wearing rags. In the middle of winter."

"Uh huh."

"How the _fuck_ are you going to pay for me? Wiggle your ears and wish for it?"

The storyteller smiled and said nothing. Karkat's mind jumped to the pile of furs that had been laying out on that night not too long ago, and his stomach sank again. He sighed.

Karkat asked, "Fine. I'll humor you. What would being your 'apprentice' entail?"

"Y'know. Traveling with me, finding stories to tell, shit like that."

Karkat shut the door, and this time, he didn't open it again.

One might have thought that after all this time, Karkat would have learned that the storyteller was going to leave him alone, but he hadn't. He expected him to leave as soon as the snow began to thaw, disappearing as quickly as he came, but he didn't. Winter turned to spring, spring turned to summer, and yet he stayed in the village, sharing stories on rare occasions. It was horrendous.

Karkat tried to put the thought of the storyteller's offer out of his mind. Whenever he caught himself thinking about it, wondering how he would pay for Karkat's apprenticeship or imagining what it would be like to travel with the storyteller instead of his owners, he mentally slapped himself. When he saw the storyteller within the village, he would avert his gaze do his best to avoid him. He pretended the offer, vague and mysterious as it was, wasn't tempting.

 _He's probably even worse than they are,_ he reasoned. _He's a self-important, egotistical storyteller who thinks he can get whatever he likes just because he wanders around and can talk well._

But still. Every time he was beaten, humiliated, or left outside to fend for himself, he found himself thinking of the offer. He wondered if this would happen quite so often, and if it would be as severe. It didn't even cross his mind that it wouldn't happen at all.

He came to the storyteller's inn room in the middle of the night, face bruised and swollen. He had a black eye, his lip was cut, and he was pretty sure his nose was broken. Fighting tears of pain did absolutely nothing. They spilled down his cheeks, dripping onto his shirt. He knocked on the door, hoping that was something at least mildly polite wherever the storyteller came from.

The storyteller allowed Karkat in, sitting him down. He left and came back with an armful of herbs, which he immediately set to grinding. The air was heavy with an unspoken understanding, one that said Karkat was allowed to leave if he wanted, but he could come with the storyteller, too. It was the hardest choice he had ever made- ever been _allowed_ to make- and he didn't want to think about it right now, so he didn't. He only thought about the herbs, wondering what the storyteller was doing with them and why he was doing it now.

The storyteller finished, adding water so it was a kind of paste, and turned to Karkat. Without a word, he began applying it to his bruises. Oh no, he wasn't actually kind, was he? _No,_ Karkat told himself unconvincingly. _He's just trying to lull me into coming with him._ Nevermind the fact that he was oddly gentle with Karkat, as though he didn't want him to get hurt, or something. Nevermind the fact that he had waited three seasons for Karkat to come with him, rather than forcing him. Nevermind all that.

"I want to go with you," he said suddenly, catching even himself off guard. The storyteller stopped, surprised.

"You sure?" he asked.

Karkat nodded, looking down at his hands. There was a reason he was here, after all, and backing out again wasn't it. Gamzee went back to applying the paste to his face without another word, but Karkat could see him smiling out of the corner of his eye.

When the storyteller finished, he wiped his hands on his pants and asked, "Do you wanna stay here tonight, motherfucker?"

"No," Karkat said, nodding yes. He scowled. "Let me think about it, okay?" He caught his mistake far too late. "I mean, uh. Can I think about it?" he asked lamely.

"Sure thing. You can chill out on the bed while you decide."

Before Karkat could argue, he left without preamble, leaving him in a virtually empty room. There was the furniture, of course, but the only sign that the storyteller had been living here for months was the light green smears on the table and the bundle of light green flowers he picked up from the apothecary so often. Karkat didn't exercise his bed privileges, opting instead to investigate the flowers. They seemed like they were used for something, although he wasn't sure what.

He sniffed them. They didn't smell like anything in particular. He had seen the storyteller nibble on them before, using the stalks, so he tried that, and immediately dropped the flowers in disgust. It was a strange, numbing taste, one that made the spot where the stem had touched his teeth tingle. Ugh. Had he just roped himself into traveling with a guy who ate _those_?

The minutes stretched into hours as Karkat waited for the storyteller to come back, becoming drowsier and drowsier. He tried sitting on a chair, standing up, sitting on the floor, but eventually he wound up on the bed, curling up in the blankets, and dropping off to sleep before he knew what was happening.


End file.
